FREEPORT – For Cranberry Island Kitchen founder Carol Ford, the idea for her business came while walking on a beach along the small island that is her company’s namesake.

“It sounds corny, but I had something like an epiphany. How can I make the great desserts I have here for the greater public?” said Ford.

Eight years later, the dream is firmly a reality, as Ford has turned her modest goals into a veritable Maine institution. Ford has found fame with her take on the whoopie pie, a culinary icon made with cake and butter-cream frosting, not entirely indigenous to Maine but now lumped alongside blueberry pie and lobster rolls as hallmarks of the state’s comfort foods.

Now, Ford has moved her entire production and retail facility from Portland to Freeport, where it occupies the third floor of Wilbur’s of Maine Chocolate Confections on Route 1.

“I really love the space,” Ford said on a tour of the Freeport facility last week. “It has great light and while not necessarily bigger, it is an easier space to work in.”

With the move, Freeport could be considered a whoopie-pie mecca. Betty Reez bakes Betty ReeZ WhoopieZ from her kitchen in Freeport, and Wicked Whoopies operates a popular retail outlet in town.

Ford, who will host a free sampling of the company’s treats beginning on Saturday, Nov. 16, from noon-6 p.m., has been a featured cook on Martha Stewart’s television show and is the winner of a “throwdown” with Food Network star Bobby Flay. A graduate of Colby College in Waterville who had no prior professional cooking experience, she started the business in the kitchen of her Falmouth home. After tinkering “countless” times with recipes for cookies, cakes and the whoopie pie, she landed on an idea that would prove to be her signature.

“I knew I wanted to use shapes inspired by the sea like clam shells and lobsters,” said Ford. “I finally found molds that would accommodate this, but it was a process. I even tried bleaching actual sea shells, but that didn’t hold up to the baking process.”

In the first of many big breaks, Ford attended a juried craft show in Westport, Conn., toting her various ocean-themed confections, and was met with confusion but ultimately found a better marketing theme.

“People thought the cookies actually contained lobster or shellfish because my sign was a little too cutesy,” said Ford. “So I needed to clear that up, but everyone loved the food.”

After seizing on the momentum of the Westport trip, Ford began to receive positive reviews from the local media and bloggers. At this point, the business was still small, but a serendipitous encounter with Stewart would change that, almost overnight, said Ford.

“I was bringing samples to various stores in Northeast Harbor (a town close to the Cranberry Island Ferry) when I found myself next to Martha in a tiny antique store,” said Ford. “She immediately wanted to see them, so we went outside so she and her assistants could taste what I had. Martha was so impressed, she invited me to be the featured chef on the season premiere of her television show.”

During the 2007 episode of the popular syndicated show, Stewart called the whoopie pie the best she had ever tasted, quite a compliment, said Ford, as Stewart has tasted “probably everything.”

“Honestly, it means more now than it did then, in hindsight,” said Ford.

Ford said quality is a hallmark of her Cranberry Island Kitchen products.

“We try and use the best ingredients we can find,” she said.

Ford said Cranberry Island Kitchen cookies and desserts use ingredients like Kate’s Homemade Butter, a local producer in Old Orchard Beach. The company uses only local eggs from free-range chickens, Maine spring water, unbleached flour, Maine sea salt, as well as organic vanilla and other spices.

“Good ingredients just taste better,” said Ford.

Reez, who has her whoopie pies in stores from Brunswick to Scarborough, said the competition is healthy.

“Whoopie pies come in a wide variety of styles. It’s really a personal preference,” said Reez.

In 2011, a bill introduced into the Maine Legislature sought to make the whoopie pie Maine’s official treat – and the Pennsylvania Dutch Tourist Board countered with a campaign claiming the whoopie pie as an Amish invention. Nonetheless, the whoopie pie became the official state treat of Maine later that year. According to a 2009 New York Times article by Micheline Maynard, Amish women would bake these desserts (known as hucklebucks, or creamy turtles at the time) and put them in farmers’ lunch pails or lunch boxes. When farmers would find the treats in their lunch, they would shout “Whoopie!” It is thought that the original whoopie pies may have been made from cake batter leftovers, according to the article.

Cranberry Island Kitchen’s co-founder, Karen Haase, left last year to pursue other ventures, said Ford, who characterized the split as amicable.

In addition to the cooking and production space, Cranberry Island Kitchen also operates a retail store adjacent to the Wilbur’s building. For now the retail arm will only be open seasonally, said Ford, adding that tri-town residents will still be able to pick up pre-ordered sweets directly at the Cranberry Island Kitchen office.

In all, the company employs two full-time bakers and additional staff as needed. With Thanksgiving and Christmas around the corner, Ford said, business is brisk.

“We also do a number of weddings, which has become a big component of our business,” she said.

The company is featured in a number of high-end catalogs, including New York City specialty food purveyor Dean and Deluca.

Despite the high profile of the company, Ford will keep operations small and anticipates establishing a long-term base in Freeport.

“Our products are meant to be enjoyed any time during the day,” said Ford.

Cranberry Island Kitchen founder Carol Ford in the office at her Freeport production facility. Ford recently moved her headquarters to Freeport from Portland. The bakery has been featured on the Food Network and her whoopie pies have been hailed as “the best anywhere” by domestic tastemaker Martha Stewart.A platter of Cranberry Island Kitchen’s whoopie pies, in lemon and pumpkin flavors.